A GONZO NOIR: An Internet Novel

[Declan Burke]

The first question people tend to ask about A GONZO NOIR is, ‘Why waste a perfectly good novel publishing it to the internet?’
This presupposes that it is good, let alone perfectly good.
Actually, it doesn’t. What people really mean is, ‘Why publish a novel-length story for free when someone might pay you to publish it as a conventional novel?’
Well, there’s a lot of reasons.
The first is that I’ve always wanted to publish a novel to the web, because it’s there and because I can. This desire predates the setting up of the blog I started to promote Irish crime fiction, Crime Always Pays.
The second reason is that I’m pretty sure the story isn’t a commercially viable one. I believe it’s up to the standard of my previously published novels, EIGHTBALL BOOGIE and THE BIG O, but the story itself – which concerns itself with a hospital porter who decides to blow up the hospital where he works – isn’t the kind of thing to get publishers’ hearts racing.
The third reason, and this is a rather more vague one, is that I feel that the protagonist, Karlsson, belongs on the web as opposed to between covers. This is just an instinct, of course, and not something I can really explain.
The fourth reason is that giving away something for free runs contrary to the prevailing spirit of our times, and I’ve always been a bit out of kilter what tends to be popular and profitable.
Fifthly, and lastly, and pragmatically, my novel THE BIG O is being published by Harcourt in September, and publishing a free novel to the internet might well be an unusual way of generating some attention for it.
If you do take the time to read some or all of A GONZO NOIR, let me take this opportunity to thank you in advance. And if you feel moved to make a comment on any aspect of the story, I will be most grateful.

Yours,

Declan Burke